Will jumped, yelling. “Hey! Ow! Stop that!”
Things devolved quickly as his grandfather began chasing him around the yard, smacking Will’s backside whenever he got close enough. Running faster, Will was surprised to discover that he still couldn’t get away from his tormentor. Damn, he’s quick for an old man! he realized. Eventually, he gave up trying to escape and ran for his sparring staff. Snatching it up, he whirled around and prepared to defend himself.
Undaunted, Arrogan launched a series of lightning-fast attacks with his much smaller weapon. Will managed to fend them off, but his grandfather outsmarted him once again. Getting in close, Arrogan hooked one foot behind Will’s ankle as he changed positions. A second later, Will was falling, and somewhere along the way his staff wound up in the old man’s grasp.
Not content with his victory, Arrogan began cackling with wicked glee as he turned the staff on its previous wielder, and Will was sent scrambling across the ground as he tried to escape real bruises.
Knowing he couldn’t outrun the old man, Will went for the other staff, and while he took several smart raps to his arms and legs, he finally got his hands on it. After that, the lesson essentially turned into one of their more usual staff-sparring sessions.
His mentor finally relented, after more than half an hour. Will stared at him, panting. “How do you move so fast? You shouldn’t be able to outrun me at your age.”
Arrogan didn’t answer for a few seconds, but finally he responded, “What is your personal turyn for?”
Will thought about it, wondering if it was a trick question. “You told me it’s what we use to function. Walking, breathing, etc…”
“So if you can control it, and even increase it, what does that mean?” added his mentor.
Will gaped at his teacher as the meaning became clear. “You’re using magic to make yourself faster!”
“I’m teaching you to be a wizard,” said Arrogan. “That doesn’t just mean learning to cast spells. It means becoming a master of magic in all its forms, the turyn in your body, the turyn in your spells, and even that of your enemy.
“That being said, your body has a limit. You can use your turyn to make yourself faster and stronger, but not beyond the physical capacity of your muscles and bones. You can give yourself an advantage in a fight, but if you try to take on a master swordsman, you’ll still be gutted because he’s spent his life training to do something you’re just dabbling at.”
“If I can make myself faster and stronger than a normal swordsman, shouldn’t I be able to beat him?” asked Will.
“Magic is life,” his grandfather informed him. “Just because you don’t see ordinary people casting spells doesn’t mean they don’t depend on it. Athletes, warriors, people that train themselves to be the best at what they do, they’re doing something very similar with their turyn. And on top of that, they’re building their physical capacity at the same time. You can use your magic in a large variety of ways, including to give yourself a physical advantage, but don’t ever make the mistake of underestimating people who train hard at fighting, or you’ll learn a painful and bloody lesson.”
Disappointed, Will responded, “When you put it like that, it makes wizardry sound a lot less exciting.”
“I just want you to have realistic expectations,” said his teacher. “Wizardry is still far better than anything else you could learn. You might never be the best swordsman, or the strongest man, or the best climber, or dancer, whatever you name, but with conscious control over your turyn you can become much better at any of those things. Your power is much more versatile, and we’re only discussing the enhancement of your physical abilities—there are far more amazing things that can be done when you consider real magic.”
“Speaking of which,” said Will, “when are you going to start teaching me magic? You said it would be after I finished learning to compress my source, so…”
“You’ve already started,” observed Arrogan. “Creating an extended layer of turyn is the first step for much of what you’ll do in the future.”
“What’s the next step then?” probed Will.
“Learning the runes,” said his grandfather immediately. “But before I teach you that, you need to master what I’ve already shown you.”
With a sigh, Will nodded and began to practice ‘expressing’ his turyn again.
Chapter 22
After two weeks of practicing what he had already learned, Will was good and sick of it. “If I have to express myself one more time, I’m going to lose my mind,” he complained.
“Don’t get married, then,” said his grandfather.
“Huh? Why don’t you ever make sense?”
The old man laughed. “It’s a joke, but I suppose you’re too young to understand.”
As much as he didn’t want to listen to yet another weird lecture from his teacher, he was desperate to distract the old man from the repetitive drills. “Explain it to me then,” he said, choosing the lesser of two evils.
“For marriage you need patience, which is one lesson you’ll have to learn, but more specifically, you have to communicate well. You have to learn to express yourself,” explained Arrogan. “Now, let’s try it again.”
Disappointed that his grandfather had finished so quickly, Will decided to fish for more. “You don’t seem like the marrying kind. How did you wind up getting married?”
Arrogan paused, as though caught in a memory. Frequently when that happened, his eventual response would be, ‘none of your damned business,’ but this time he answered, “My teacher was determined to make sure I learned this lesson, so she took it upon herself to make it her life’s work.”
“Your teacher was a woman?” asked Will, somewhat confused. Then his mind clicked, putting together what his grandfather had said. “Wait! You married your teacher?”
Arrogan nodded. “She didn’t give me much choice, but then, she always knew my mind better than I did. Aislinn made that same silly joke about learning to express myself, then she spent more than a century reinforcing the lesson.”
“Hmm,” said Will. “All you ever do is swear and berate people. I don’t think you learned it properly.”
His grandfather growled, “I make my feelings known. That’s the point. But I’ll admit, I may have been a little different back then. You’ll see one day. A good woman makes you want to put your best foot forward.”
Will doubted his grandfather had a ‘good’ foot. As far as he could tell, Arrogan was sour and mean from back to front. Rather than point that out, he asked a different question, “Wasn’t it a little unusual to marry your teacher?”
Arrogan shrugged. “Even in my day, wizards were uncommon. We didn’t have many peers to pass judgement on us, and we were a good match, though she was a little older than me.”
“How much is a little?”
“Forty-three years,” said Arrogan, his lips curving into a faint smile as he waited for his grandson’s reaction.
Stunned, Will almost shouted, “She was older than my mother!”